Neighborhood-Based Changes in New Ordinance Outlined at Media Briefing

December 16, 2003

Spend
any time traveling through one of Chicago’s “hot” residential neighborhoods, and
you’ll see one: a tall, skinny, new construction condo building towering over
its single-family neighbors. Prohibiting this urban design disaster is one of
several significant improvements in the City’s revised zoning code. Today, at a
briefing for media, the Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC) highlighted other
significant changes to neighborhood zoning contained in the first update to
Chicago’s code since 1957. MPC also presented its Zoning Change Strategy — a
model for getting local communities involved in the zoning mapping process that
will determine the future character of their
neighborhoods.

“Zoning
can do more than regulate bulk, use, and location,” said MarySue Barrett,
president of the Planning Council. “It’s a tool that shapes communities in a way
that preserves neighborhood character and enhances quality of life, by expanding
housing options, promoting transit-oriented development, and protecting open
space.”

MPC’s
work around Chicago’s historic rewrite of its zoning code has focused on
broadening community participation. In 2001, MPC conducted focus groups in four
Chicago neighborhoods to identify creative zoning solutions to residents’
concerns. Ultimately, nine of MPC’s top recommendations were adopted by the
Mayor’s Zoning Reform Commission and are included in the pending text. In 2003,
MPC unveiled its Zoning Change Strategy in two local neighborhoods — West Town
and Rogers Park — and will work with three additional communities in 2004:
Lawndale, Logan Square, and South Chicago.

“It’s
ironic that the City of Neighborhoods has no strategy for creating a new zoning
map in the neighborhoods,” noted Peter Skosey, MPC’s vice president of external
relations, who leads the Council’s zoning project. “Our Zoning Change Strategy
is a model that gives local residents a voice in the future of their
communities. And, it can be applied in any ward. We’d like to see the City be an
innovator in this second phase of zoning reform, as they were with the
first.”

MPC’s
mapping process has three steps. One, MPC provides the communities with basic
zoning training plus maps, cameras, and logbooks. Two, teams of two to three
people go block by block recording assets and challenges. Three, after the
community has compiled its data, MPC analyzes it and returns recommendations
based on the proposed zoning districts in the new code.

Said
Tiffany Childress,
New
Communities program organizer
for Lawndale Christian Development Corporation, “The new zoning districts are
very important to our planning process. Planning and projects concerning retail,
recreational areas, and housing could become obsolete if not synchronous with
the city’s zoning.”

In
Lawndale, MPC’s Zoning Change Strategy will complement a comprehensive planning
effort the community is undertaking as a part of the Local Initiatives Support
Corporation’s New Communities Initiative.

Other
zoning changes MPC highlighted at today’s briefing addressed the following
neighborhood challenges and possible solutions:

Uneven front yards;

Patio pits, blank walls facing the street, and
front-facing garages;

Drive-throughs on classic pedestrian streets;

No standards for auto-oriented commercial streets;

700 linear miles of underutilized commercial zoning;

Open space;

One-size-fits-all parking requirements; and

Overly
generous sign regulations.

The
Chicago City Council is expected to vote on the new ordinance in early 2004,
with remapping to begin soon thereafter. At today’s briefing, MPC reviewed its
new publication
Lay of the Land 2003, A National Survey of Zoning Reform
,
an update to its 1999 zoning survey that compares mapping and community
participation in 12 cities.

Founded in 1934, MPC is a nonprofit,
nonpartisan group of business and civic leaders committed to serving the public
interest through the promotion and implementation of sensible planning and
development policies necessary for a world-class Chicago
region.

Shaping a more equitable, sustainable and prosperous greater Chicago region

For more than 80 years, the Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC) has made the Chicago region a better place to live and work by partnering with businesses, communities and governments to address the area's toughest planning and development challenges. MPC works to solve today's urgent problems while consistently thinking ahead to prepare the region for the needs of tomorrow. Read more about our work »